The tea trade has played a key role in many major events and is an important clue to understanding the history of modern world civilization. Tea was introduced to Britain in 1657. In less than a century, the cost of tea for British middle-class households exceeded the cost of food. Tea was the "first product ever advertised in London." When tea became a dietary habit for British workers, it was not only a consumer good but also widely regarded as an essential element for restoring physical strength after work. Many scholars believe that tea provided significant momentum to the industrialization process of Britain. The demand for tea reached a level of dependency, causing a shortage of silver in Britain for exchange. As a result, British merchants used opium instead of silver to balance the tea trade, which triggered the Opium War.
In November 1773, to protest against British tax laws in North America, Boston residents boarded the tea ships of the East India Company. Amid shouts of "Boston Harbor will be a teapot tonight," 340 chests of tea were dumped into the sea. This event of dumping tea laid the groundwork for the American Revolutionary War. Not long after gaining independence, the United States adopted the development of foreign trade as its basic national policy. The first direct merchant ship to China, the "Empress of China," returned home fully loaded, primarily with tea. To such an extent that American historian Hughes joked: "In every village on every small river in America, even sailboats that can carry only five people are preparing to set off for China to load tea."
The production of tea reflects the historical inevitability of capitalist industrialization replacing feudal rural economies. In 1792, Sir Macartney, the British ambassador, and botanist Joseph Banks, acting on behalf of the British government, introduced tea plants from China to India. After adopting plantation management, mechanized production, and advanced transportation, British-produced tea gradually dominated the world market. In the early 18th century, tea accounted for 74% of the goods purchased by the Dutch; in the early 19th century, in the trade between the British East India Company and China, tea constituted over 90% of Chinese goods, with commercial profits amounting to 10% of the annual revenue of the British Treasury. By the early 20th century, Hankou Customs, the main port for China's tea exports, no longer had any tea to export, leading to the complete collapse of China's tea trade, losing its status as a traditional major exporter corresponding to its origin country.
In 1693, the Qing court’s Lifan Yuan gave this response to the Russian delegation’s request to open a tea trading port: "All the world knows that the barbarians present tribute and seek trade with China, but China has never found it necessary to send envoys to the barbarians for trade. This matter should not be considered." This vividly demonstrates the closed-off, self-sufficient, and trade-averse mentality of traditional Chinese culture, which perceived itself as the center of the world. This missed China's first opportunity to enter the international market and achieve modernization. Fortunately, the Chinese nation woke up after 200 years, implemented reform and opening-up, finally joining the World Trade Organization, and entering an era where national strength and the global economy depend on each other harmoniously for development.
China's tea exports have always been peaceful, honest, and mutually beneficial. In September 1745, the Swedish ship Göteborg, specifically built to conduct maritime trade with China, sank just less than one kilometer away from its home port during its third return voyage. Of the 700 tons of Chinese goods it carried, 370 tons were tea. In 1986, the people of Göteborg returned a package of the more than 200 tons of salvaged tea to China for exhibition at the Guangzhou Museum.
Tea dissolves in water, and tea also integrates into world civilization. The inseparable bond between humans and tea determines that tea civilization becomes a common wealth of all humanity. It will remain a living civilization forever, accompanying humanity forward.